Life Swim.

I just took an intensely long deep, dive down into someone else's life by reading their journal.

I swam past tiny, mundane details ("Here's what I had for lunch today!") and could make out the murky forms of gigantic Life Revelations moving around in the darkness below me ("I could never connect with my parents and sometimes I secretly hate them.").
I trolled around for nearly an hour, diving down deeper and deeper into the past, each journal entry going further and further into the past. ("If George Bush wins this election...") I looked around it was well over a year ago, where I was, with more to explore ahead of me.
And the author of this particularly aquatic journal is a refreshingly honest person. They make no efforts to hide their victories, amusements and basic needs.
I saw the refreshingly vibrant colors of the coral reefs that make up their Romantic Life. ( " Guess what, he loved my antipasto last night.")
A school of Amusing Anecdotes darted past me, completely ignoring my presence as they presented themselves to me. ("You should see what this guy at work has on. I thought 'Gay Pride Week' is next month.")
I swam around, diving down as far as I would dare, skimming sections and focusing in with laser proficiency on topics that interested me. I blocked everything else out and let myself get lost in the totality of this other persons vividly recounted life.
("Which makes total sense, if you consider my deeply religious upbringing and how hard I worked to get away from all of that.")
By the time I was done and swam for the surface, nearly an hour had passed and I had to pull away and come back here to my comfortable shoreline to seek refuge. My eyes watered from the strain and I have fat droplets of their life, still in my ears, clinging to me, stubbornly. ("I want.." "I need.." "I love...") I think that if I walk around a bit and exercise my jaw, my ears will pop and I'll put some distance between me and the person I just swam around in.

In actual life, I've spent less than an hour in this persons company. I have no perspective on how they want to present themselves to me, in real life. I only know them as the person that they present in their journal. As the person that I suspect them truly to be. Future interractions will be an odd mix of getting to know them and reconciling the person that I see with the person that I just read about.

Or swam around in, if you'll forgive the heavy-handed poetry...

Mr. B.

PS. I wonder if that experience is what it is like for people to read back into this blog. Or if I'm the only nerd who actually bothers to dig backwards through other people's writings to read that stuff. I think other people just skim and look for juicy sex or their own names.